Freedom of Religion: Aztecs

[E.man]

PNG tribes continued head shrinking and eating enemies into the 20th Century.

Some of them got the brain wasting disease from it.

I guess that's a bit different from killing your own people, but the Aztecs were apparently killing other people too.

 

[EnglishEdward]

I think it quite likely that there was a year on two in which the Aztecs killed 250,000 people.

But that would likely have been a combination of killed in battle, transported for ritual
sacrifice at temples and simple massacres of the weak in captured towns and villages.

Transporting as many as 250,000 prisoners to centralised temples seems logistically impractical.

 

[Zardnaar]

I think it quite likely that there was a year on two in which the Aztecs killed 250,000 people.

But that would likely have been a combination of killed in battle, transported for ritual
sacrifice at temples and simple massacres of the weak in captured towns and villages.

Transporting as many as 250,000 prisoners to centralised temples seems logistically impractical.

I think there were more than one temple not sure if each community had one.

Highest number the Aztecs claimed was 80k and that's dubious as it comes via the Spanish who may have lied or reported an exaggerated Aztec number.

Think that was for consecration of the main temple in the capital.

To hit 250k that year you would have to butcher something close to 500 people a day or close to 1 every minute 10 hours a day.

So very very unlikely/impossible unless it's over multiple locations. They have found at least on site with an alter iirc outside the capital. Doesn't prove much though as the alters were destroyed.

Said skull racks/tower.

Weiterleitungshinweis

www.google.com

4 alters over four days for 80k is 14 a minute.

Human Sacrifices: How Many were Killed In Aztec Culture? - History

Human sacrifices Aztecs were a part of their religious ceremony that they believed properly appeased their gods to spare them from suffering.

www.historyonthenet.com

Nit picking over the numbers is pointless imho as we can't prove any number. They practiced human sacrifice their neighbors hated them.

The 80k is inflated from 4k apparently.

 

[Thorgalaeg]

I think they all practiced human sacrifice in some degree. Incas sacrificed children in special occasions or to appease gods because famines and such. Most old world ancient civilizations did it too, Phoenicians for instance were great aficionados. Even Romans did it occasionally in early times even if later it was considered uncivilized and barbaric. I think that, for ancient civilizations, human sacrifices, even if practiced occasionally, was the rule rather than the exception. Aztecs otoh were the only ones to carry the practice to industrial levels.

 

[Zardnaar]

I think they all practiced human sacrifice in some degree. Incas sacrificed children in special occasions or to appease gods because famines and such. Most old world ancient civilizations did it too, Phoenicians for instance were great aficionados. Even Romans did it occasionally in early times even if later it was considered uncivilized and barbaric. I think that, for ancient civilizations, human sacrifices, even if practiced occasionally, was the rule rather than the exception. Aztecs otoh were the only ones to carry the practice to industrial levels.

Think Rome stopped doing it 500BC or so and it was rare then afaik.
Christianity gets a bad rap these days but I remember at uni the classics lecturer's pointed out why it took off initially.

 

[AmazonQueen]

Think Rome stopped doing it 500BC or so and it was rare then afaik.
Christianity gets a bad rap these days but I remember at uni the classics lecturer's pointed out why it took off initially.

Last time its recorded as happening was during the 2nd Punic War after the Battle of Cannae in 216 BC https://www.livescience.com/59514-cultures-that-practiced-human-sacrifice/2.html
Punic child sacrifice is now regarded as probably a myth https://phoenicia.org/childsacrifice.html
A good example of the victors writing what became accepted as the truth.

 

[Marla_Singer]

Navigation into the high seas had been developing for a long time and the constant warfare in the Mediterranean contributed to it. It spilled over into the Atlantic and led to attempts at outflanking the north africans. And indeed later the ottomans. There were battles between portuguese and ottoman ships as far as Sumatra.

That is correct indeed.

By the 14th and 15th century, Italian city-states controlled the very profitable routes connecting Europe to Near East where ended the Silk Road since Roman times (Antioch). Portugal being far from Italian ports was really at the end of trade routes, making spices even more expensive there, and this even before the fall of Constantinople. What actually triggered sea exploration in Portugal was the conquest of Ceuta in 1415, under the reign of Henry the Navigator. What's interesting is how it actually happened. The important point is that no one at the time has ever managed to navigate the coast South of Cape Bojador (South of Morocco). None of the Phoenicians, Greeks, Romans, or Arabs ever successfuly passed that Cape. There's a source saying a Carthaginian expedition led by Hanno did so in 5th century BC but this is disputed, and even if he really did so, it didn't lead to establishing any reliable trade route, eventually being forgotten. As such, the Arabs who did trade with Sub-Saharan Africa did so with land caravans crossing the desert.

So how did the Portuguese succeeded to do what no one else achieved before them? Portuguese were cod fishers, and cod is a deep-sea fish. They initially borrowed viking shipping technology and gradually improved it for their own fishing needs, eventually inventing the famous caravel. Everything took another dimension in 1434 when Gil Eanes successfully passed Cape Bojador, and even more importantly, returned. Indeed, it appeared there wasn't any huge craft-eating monsters South of that point, as people imagined. The problem actually turned out to be a very strong current pushing South everything floating along the coast. Therefore the good way to come back from the South, was actually to sail deep into the Atlantic to the Azores, which had been discovered by the Portuguese a little earlier in 1427, and then sail back East to Lisbon. This is what opened to Portugal the roads to explore African shores.

But even that wasn't enough. As another strong current, this time towards the North, prevented Portuguese explorers to go beyond the Gulf of Guinea, at the level of today's Nigeria. They had to find more favourable waterways deeper in the South Atlantic Ocean. And it took until 1481 for the Portuguese to perfect the Mariner's astrolabe to finally achieve so, reaching the mouth of the Congo river in 1482, nearly 50 years later. From that point, Portuguese sailed always further West in the South Atlantic to finally find the point to pass the end of Africa, which was eventually achieved by Bartolemeu Dias who reached the Cape of Good Hope in 1488. From that point, everything will go very fast. Christopher Columbus will discover the Americas four years later in 1492, but that feat would have probably been done by Portuguese explorers a little later as it's assumed they modified Treaty of Tordesillas in 1494 because they presupposed the existence of a continent West of the South Atlantic, where they landed in 1500 with Pedro Alvares Cabral. Meanwhile, Vasco de Gama reached India in 1498, and only a generation later, Elcano fulfilled circumnavigation with Magellan's expedition from 1519 to 1522.


Sorry I didn't initially intend to write such a long post but I've grown a bit passionate about all that. It was no small feat to develop deep sea navigation reliable enough to allow a direct trade route with any harbour on earth. This totally restructured world trade, with the Europeans taking control of it, therefore giving them access to all resources available on earth, and to all knowledge existing on the planet. It radically changed the course of History in the whole world for the centuries to come.

 

[Lexicus]

such things were cut short before they could be replicated in the continent.

The contemporary sources and other evidence are very clear that this is not the case. The natives on the continent, those who survived the epidemic disease and massacres in the wars of conquest, were then mostly worked to death on the encomiendas.

If you want a comparison, consider the persian empire, how it was quickly conquered and hellenized by the macedonians led by Alexander.

Zoroastrianism was still the prevailing religion on the Iranian plateau many centuries after Alexander (indeed it was not until after the Muslim conquests, almost a full thousand years after Alexander, that it died out in Iran and the surrounding area). This is not a good analogy at all.

 

[AmazonQueen]

The contemporary sources and other evidence are very clear that this is not the case. The natives on the continent, those who survived the epidemic disease and massacres in the wars of conquest, were then mostly worked to death on the encomiendas.



Zoroastrianism was still the prevailing religion on the Iranian plateau many centuries after Alexander (indeed it was not until after the Muslim conquests, almost a full thousand years after Alexander, that it died out in Iran and the surrounding area). This is not a good analogy at all.

And Persian/Iranian culture and language survived the Greeks, Arabs and Turks (and heavily influenced the latter 2) and remain dominant in Iran today. Hellenisation was very superficial and confined to a tiny elite.

 

[Joij21]

To all the miserable woke people on this forum, what if these Aztecs align themselves with Vladimir Putin and decide to buy his oil and support his invasion of Ukraine? What then? Would you be supporting Aztec sacrifices, or would it now be used as slander and vilification for a propagandistic rallying cry to take them out in order to hurt Putin?

At least "if we don't sacrifice people the gods will go hungry and be unable to sustain the world!" at least has the merit of being an internally sound reason to kill people (as in, were it true that the gods will be unable to sustain the universe if sacrifices are not made, then making the sacrifices does appear as a logically and morally sound choice since in the alternative everyone dies as opposed to just the human sacrifices). The excuses deployed by monotheistic religions over god getting upset for the past two thousand years (and still deployed) are rather less sound.

Yeah and yet a good moral justification for the Spanish killing off the Aztecs in the past could also exist based on similar logic. For instance if a future Aztecca developed nukes, then aimed them toward western countries and aligned itself with Putin or some other imperialist power. Suddenly all of a sudden the Spanish genociding the Aztecs in the far flung past becomes a net positive for future generations who don't have to worry anymore about nuclear extinction from Montezuma XVI.

Also to all the other natives under the jackboot of the Aztecs, the Aztecs were the evil imperialist power and greater of two evils! Hence their allying with the Spanish to seek revenge for being enslaved and abused for too long. You are pro-slavery and imperialist if you support Aztec sacrifices.

 

[Gorbles]

To all the miserable woke people on this forum, what if these Aztecs align themselves with Vladimir Putin and decide to buy his oil and support his invasion of Ukraine? What then?

I'd say this is a pretty shallow scenario that doesn't account for a cohesive list of changes that a modern-day Aztec nation would have caused on history. Can you give some more backstory? Are they at all democratic? Do they still practise human sacrifice? Who's their leader? Are they elected? What's the healthcare like?

. . . or were you just suggesting the Aztec empire then magically started existing now? Because that seems pretty daft 😅

 

[Kyriakos]

Plenty of other genocidal nations still exist ^_^

 

[Joij21]

I'd say this is a pretty shallow scenario that doesn't account for a cohesive list of changes that a modern-day Aztec nation would have caused on history. Can you give some more backstory? Are they at all democratic? Do they still practise human sacrifice? Who's their leader? Are they elected? What's the healthcare like?

. . . or were you just suggesting the Aztec empire then magically started existing now? Because that seems pretty daft 😅

The whole basis of this entire thread is if the Aztecs still existed and still practiced sacrifice, are still a monarchy, yet industrialized. Get with the thread man! 🤡

So sorry to say but your just resorting to denying the subject of what this entire thread is about because you lost the argument and have nothing to refute what I just claimed.

 

[Gorbles]

The whole basis of this entire thread is if the Aztecs still existed and still practiced sacrifice, are still a monarchy, yet industrialized. Get with the thread man! 🤡

The OP does include the sacrifice, that's right, but uh there have been ten pages (at least) since then, so I'm sorry for missing what you obviously intended to be 100% aligned with Zardnaar's original scenario with no changes . . . except for all the changes you added to fit your weird "woke people suck" agenda. Okay

(also the OP says nothing about a monarchy. I mean sure it's pretty similar but there's probably another page or two of a tangent based on that alone - certainly no requirement that they had to keep it exactly as they had it hundreds of years ago)

So sorry to say but your just resorting to denying the subject of what this entire thread is about

No, I was trying to understand your seemingly random self-insert about the invasion of Ukraine by Russia. In hindsight, it looks like a pretty poor attempt at making this thread about a completely different thread entirely. "what if this theoretical country did some things that people agreed or disagreed with based on political positions held".

Man, what if. Imagine that. A country doing something I agreed with, or a country doing something I didn't agree with. Definitely not something that happens literally every day, all the time.

because you lost the argument

What argument?

and have nothing to refute what I just claimed

I don't need to disprove stuff that isn't even evidenced in the first place. If you want to have a fever dream, you can go ahead and do that, but nobody has to take it seriously - especially if you're just going to reply with word salads and clown emoji

 

[r16]

isn't this thread about going the Spanish stomp the Aztec route to destroy Russia ?

 

[Joij21]

The OP does include the sacrifice, that's right, but uh there have been ten pages (at least) since then, so I'm sorry for missing what you obviously intended to be 100% aligned with Zardnaar's original scenario with no changes . . . except for all the changes you added to fit your weird "woke people suck" agenda. Okay

(also the OP says nothing about a monarchy. I mean sure it's pretty similar but there's probably another page or two of a tangent based on that alone - certainly no requirement that they had to keep it exactly as they had it hundreds of years ago)

No, I was trying to understand your seemingly random self-insert about the invasion of Ukraine by Russia. In hindsight, it looks like a pretty poor attempt at making this thread about a completely different thread entirely. "what if this theoretical country did some things that people agreed or disagreed with based on political positions held".

Man, what if. Imagine that. A country doing something I agreed with, or a country doing something I didn't agree with. Definitely not something that happens literally every day, all the time.

What argument?

I don't need to disprove stuff that isn't even evidenced in the first place. If you want to have a fever dream, you can go ahead and do that, but nobody has to take it seriously - especially if you're just going to reply with word salads and clown emoji

Look all I'm saying is that if the Aztecs still had a sovereign state (based around Zard's presumptions) yet they ended up supporting Putin, you wouldn't bat an eye if America invaded them for "freedom".

Yet if somehow they did nothing but sacrifice their own people all day and America then invades, then you guys lose your s*** and call it American imperialism!

 

[El_Machinae]

What's the latest invasion you feel like people approved of?

 

[Birdjaguar]

"all I'm saying is...."

Give peace a chance....

 

[Joij21]

What's the latest invasion you feel like people approved of?

Bashar Al Assad basically sacrifices his own people via nerve gas and everyone approves America bombing the crap out of him with tomahawk missiles. Everyone approves cause with gas it's a "war crime".

Spanish destroy the Aztec government for sacrificing their own people on bloody alters to their deities. People lose their minds and are opposed to it because ripping out people's hearts in the name of your religion is simply "culture".

Yet however if a Christian group had done human sacrifice in the same way and the group had been the state religion of a modern nation state many of the same people would have no problem seeing that nation's government destroyed. Because Christianity is mostly associated with white people, yet Meso-American beliefs are associated with those races of the indigenous variety.

In other words it is a perfect example of how reverse racism has now become mainstream. Fifteen years ago people on this forum would be rooting for the Spanish or making jokes about Montezuma using nukes in the modern era in Civ4! Everyone's too woke now! That's why this forum is dying, it's being replaced by a Marxist/post-modernist crowd who no longer care about the game we all grew up on. These people just don't no what fun is anymore. These Marxists are destroying all leisure activities in modern America and the West and making politically correct mountains out of every mole hill! It's why we are now so divided today, yet everyone's too afraid to call them out for what they are clearly trying to do! Ruin all fun to make life miserable so they can have a better try at converting others to their extremist beliefs!

 

[Kyriakos]

It's not like the spanish destroyed the aztecs due to some moral outrage for the human sacrifices. They just wanted more treasure and loot.